Lesbians and gender neutral electrical fires...

One of the things that heterosexual couples have is a sort of pre-existing template for how stuff is going to get done around the house. In social research, we liked to talk about the "household division of labor"...which is just fancy sociological talk for...uh....the household division of labor.

Anyway, a lot of it was traditionally divided along gender lines. Women would plan for, prepare and cook meals, vacuum, dust, sweep, mop, make beds, clean windows, shop, handle correspondence, care for the children, handle family activity scheduling, handle interior decoration, do the laundry, iron, care for anyone who was sick, sew, clean and disinfect the bathrooms, care for pets, plan and execute holidays and family celebrations, and be solely responsible for acquiring the vast collection of attractive but useless little throw pillows that accumulate randomly throughout the house.

In all fairness, men also had a lot of household stuff to do. I mean, they were soley responsible for starting all the indoor and outdoor fires and floods associated with plumbing, electrical repair, car maintenance, lawn care, and operating the BBQ. They also had to take out the trash, and remember to lose the television remote EVERY night.

That's a lot of stuff that has to get done to keep a household running...and at one time the household division of labor decisions were closely associated with the fact that men were the ones out there in the labor market.

Now that women are equally present in the labor market, there have (thankfully) been some changes made in gendered expectations to better reflect this reality. For example, since women are out there working for a paycheck too, NOW when they come home after working 8-10 hours at a job, all they have to do is plan for, prepare and cook meals, vacuum, dust, sweep, mop, make beds, clean windows, shop, handle correspondence, care for the children, handle family activity scheduling, decorate the house, do the laundry, iron, care for anyone sick, sew, clean and disinfect the bathrooms, care for the pets, plan and execute holidays and family celebrations, and be solely responsible for acquiring the vast collection of attractive but useless little throw pillows that accumulate randomly throughout the house.

Sociologists needed some fancy terminology for this phenomenon, so they called it the "Second Shift." Work all day at your job so you can come home, and go to work at the second job.

But, I'm a lesbian. I don't have to worry about that crap.

Lesbians seem to make their decisions about the division of household labor based on who can do what, and who has the time. It has very little to do with who has a vagina. Most lesbians have vaginas. I have a vagina. I still can't cook. At all. Anyone who knows me, knows this (about the cooking, not the vagina thing). My ex-wife used to physically remove me from "HER" kitchen.

You burn poptarts ONE time, and people never let you forget it. It's not like I'm psychic, and just magically KNEW you had to take them out of the foil before putting them in the toaster.

Whatever.

Come to think of it, my vagina hasn't helped me much with sewing, either. Or with changing the oil in the car. Or decorating. Or ironing. My ex-wife wouldn't let me do the laundry anymore after I shrunk one of her sweaters so small that it fit the cat.

It's true that if neither person knows how to do something that needs done, you have to resort to asking for outside help. My last relationship, neither of us knew how to do ANYTHING with the vehicles, so we bothered our neighbor a lot. Just to ask stupid questions, like where the oil went, or how long you had to blow into the nozzle thingies to get the tires to inflate...

It occurs to me that vagina or no vagina (I'm saying vagina a lot in this post, and I'm enjoying it), I don't seem to be very helpful around the house, I mean, there is some stuff I can do. Once I learned to never mix Mr. Clean with Lysol toilet bowl cleaner (unless you are fumigating for people), I got pretty good at cleaning things.

Vagina, vagina, vagina.

Oops.

I also can balance plates on my boobs when watching TV, so I'm not completely useless. And...I can start a toaster fire just as good as anyone who has a penis.

OMG. Where's the remote?